IslamicAnswers.com: Islamic Advice

Asalamualaykum brother and sisters,

I'm going through a very rough patch in my life surrounding the woman of my dreams, her family, and them organizing a forced marriage. I'm sure there are plenty of questions similar to mine, but honestly its still difficult to figure out what I'm to do or how I'm supposed to continue. I guess I'll start with a little by myself: I am a African American 23 year old revert of 3 years, born in the USA and I try my best to perform my Islamic duties on the daily and I believe and trust in Islam. I try to be a better Muslim everyday despite having my own revert issues (considering support and my own family) but that's a story for another time, I'll focus on this particular problem of mine regarding a woman that i wish to marry.

A few years ago, I met the most amazing woman I had ever met. She is of Pakistani origin, but from the USA as well. Shes around the same age as me, and we started out as best friends. She is a wonderful woman and brought out the best in me in any regard whether it was making my life better or dealing with family issues. Anyways eventually we both had interest in each other and about 2 years ago she told her mother about me and her, and how we wished to make everything halal. Quite simply we just wanted to be together start a family and be happy. Simple. Not hard to understand. At first when she told her mother everything was okay for about a week, then everything pretty much blew out of proportion from there. Her mother had a big problem with me, and insisted that the girl I love marry her own cousin who she had past relations with. Things have gone down hill since then, and although I tried to prove myself to her mother in every way, she had always had some excuse on why I was a bad match. Honestly not wanting to play the race card I really sat down and took a look at myself trying to figure out what is wrong with me. Why was I looked so down upon? Was I really that bad of a person? So many things were kind of pushed into my mind driving me quite insane. Then things took a turn for the worse and her mother randomly came up with the ideal for them to have a trip to Pakistan. Now perhaps at the beginning I may have not known much about how desi culture works, but at this point I was an adept and knew very well what was going on. I knew it was a trap..... The thing was I was powerless to stop it. So they ended up going to Pakistan under the cover it was a "vacation", it mutated into a forced marriage trap that has caused stress and depression for everyone. The cousin that is to be the husband also brings his drama and issues to the table as well. They had a relationship in the past that ended horribly, and for some odd reason the mother of the woman I love ADORES him, despite everything that he has done wrong and all the issues that are currently present inside his personality, such as intense anger and a disregard for peoples feelings. It's hard sometimes to see if he even cares for the woman he claims to want to marry!! Everything just looks like a public gimmick to make the onlookers think he cares but for the actual marriage and the person it involves, nothing. She was completely honest with him and told him how she felt about being forced and she loves someone else, but he did not care and just told her to 'deal with it'. How can her mother be so blinded? I don't know honestly it makes no sense. He has already exhibited traits of an abusive husband but it's like everyone in her family chooses to continue with this foolishness.... After seeing these things, her mother still pushes for the marriage and straight ignores everything he does, but when it was me she'd even make it a point to MAKE UP bad things about me that were untrue... I don't understand I really don't. I hate talking bad about people or focusing on the negative but I need everyone to see the grand scope of things in why they don't make sense to me... there's so much more but trust me, its just worse things that make this make LESS sense than it already seems. The explanations on why things work the way they work doesn't make sense either... it just 'is how it is". Like everyone acknowledges the issues but instead of dealing with them straight up, everyone chooses to do their own "solutions" in the shadows which leads to more and more problems!!! No one wants to just come out with the truth and deal with it like grown ups.... and its just exhausting.

Now here's the thing, normally everyone would say "okay so go fight her family for her hand in marriage" or " just let her go man, its over" etc etc etc but I cannot do either... It's not like she wants this, and she's not in a position to change everything because her mother has basically took all her money, legal documents, transportation, basically everything that makes her independent. That went on for a year, and as much as this is my post, the most painful thing that this has done to me is force me to watch the woman I love suffer. The depression and mental breakdowns she has gone through in the past year have effected her in the worst way I cannot even describe... Shes cried, screamed, fought, even thought of suicide (which is the worst thing, and I've had to talk to her about it, trying to get her to remember Allah and also try and cheer her up on the side, but it was always temporary.) She's barely making it and I don't know how much longer either of us can hold out, without doing something crazy... We cannot just drop it either, we've tried. For some odd reason something always happens that forces us back to talk even after months.....The love we share is real. I know many people will question if shes lying, or if she's trying to let me go or wants to let me go but doesn't know how. We've been through so much and both have sacrificed so much just to be happy together. For her to lie makes no sense, and I know her personality; she's a real straight up person and doesn't hesitate to share her feelings. I trust her and what she says, just as she does the same for me and that is why we "worked". The ONLY issue we have is with her family. We've fixed our cultural differences intra-personally but it's the ones on the outside that plague us.....

Present day, shes been forced to do a nikah to him for about 4-5 months, and she just seems so depressed now its destroying her health and I worry for her. The only reason I don't get her myself is because she herself disagreed to it because she said it was dangerous (more so for her than for me which I understand now) and also we'd still have problems because she still would not have her passport or anything which could take 3-4 weeks to receive if we went thru the US embassy. She tried to do it herself there but her mom found out and it caused more problems for her. We are both just stuck in this horrible situation and its emotionally draining everybody..... No one is happy, not even her mom at this point and everything is still stagnant. I really don't know what else to do, I'm lost. We still want our family and happiness which we know is still there... we've prayed hoped everything trying to get through.... I hope Allah forgives me because I don't even know whats right or wrong it's so mixed up and confusing it's just crazy.... I was hoping to get some advice, anything helps.

Thanks,
Without VerryBerry